"Decision Time" is back! In this interactive feature, editor Brian Lovett will share a scenario from his 25-plus years of hunting turkeys. Each hinges on a critical decision. Post what choice you would have made, and then see how things actually turned out.

Conclusion: That's the Jakes

To be honest, my decision had already been made for me. You probably noticed that none of the local gobblers were willing to stand their ground and face off against the massive gangs of jakes roaming the Texas landscape. When the latest batch of shortbeards announced its presence, the gobblers approaching my calling were already aware of it and likely reacted quickly.

That is, they got out of there. I didn't realize that until about 45 seconds later, when I yelped and heard the gobblers respond — 50 yards farther from where they'd last been. The next gobble was 50 yards farther yet, and then the gobbling stopped.

I looked back at my buddy and laughed. What could we do? We'd had four longbeards almost within range that morning, and every one had been run off by jakes.

I'll tell you what we did. We made plans to hunt Texas this spring. All those dang jakes will be 2-year-olds. The only decision we'll have to make is how to carry all those birds back to the truck.